


Let the Game begin

by myriade



Category: Noblesse (Manhwa)
Genre: 999 fusion, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-16
Updated: 2016-05-16
Packaged: 2018-06-08 15:25:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6860689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myriade/pseuds/myriade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>M-21 gets dragged into a cruel game where the players are forced to put their lives on the line. Meanwhile, Frankenstein and Seira—trusting him to stay alive—infiltrate the group that organises the game in order to take it down for good.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let the Game begin

Frankenstein and Seira followed their guide down a hallway decked with paintings, vases and statues. There were light crowns in the high vault ceiling and a red carpet covering the floor. The impression it gave was expensive and fancy; to Frankenstein, it was ostentatious.

Their guide stopped by a large double door and pushed them open. The doors slid open soundlessly, revealing an—if possible—even _more_ ostentatiously decorated room. 

There was a large group of people inside, all of them richly dressed and staring intently at some very large screens at the front of the room.

Seira’s hand tightened on Frankenstein’s arm—her only show of emotion—and he immediately saw what caused the twitch:

There were nine profiles on the screens, numbered 1 to 9. On the first screen, Im Suyi’s smiling face greeted them. 

Frankenstein righted his tie—though of course it wasn’t crooked—to keep his hand from clenching into a fist. Suyi was a child still—to have her dragged into something as horrible as this…

Frankenstein turned his attention away from her screen and couldn’t keep his teeth from clenching when he saw the third screen.

M-21 looks uncharacteristically soft in the picture. His customary scowl was lost to confusion. It was a picture Tao had taken—catching M-21 by surprise—that the children had asked for a copy of. Frankenstein wasn’t sure how these people got a hold of the picture, but he _would_ find out.

The doors closed behind them with a soft click that prompted the two of them to move farther into the room.

Most of the conversation seemed to take place through translators—unsurprising, considering how international the gathering appeared.

Seira tucked a stray lock of her hair behind her ear. She was dressed to the nines in a flowing green dress—an optimal medium between wide enough for free movement and tight enough to keep from getting caught on something—complementing the green contact lenses and her dyed red hair. There was a USB-transmitter hidden in her complexly arranged hair. 

Frankenstein too had dyed his hair, black, and put in brown contacts to ensure they both looked different enough that they wouldn’t be immediately recognised. Where Seira had her hair arranged, Frankenstein had simply tied his hair back to hide his USB-transmitter. 

“Welcome to the 23rd Nonary Game!” a voice rang out, crystal clear and loud enough to break through the conversations taking place. It came from a man in a suit, standing at the front of the room with a microphone in his hand. “It’s almost time to start, so we would like for you to place your bets.”

Betting on the lives of others… Despicable.

The murmuring in the room started up again. Frankenstein caught snippets of conversations.

“The large man seems like a safe bet.”

“How boring—why not bet on something that would give more?”

“Why would I want to risk losing money?”

That losing money was the chief concern rather than someone losing their life set Frankenstein’s teeth on edge.

‘ _Please keep you calm, Chairman,_ ’ Seira’s voice rang through the temporary mental link Master helped them set up. ‘ _We cannot draw too much attention to ourselves._ ’ She was right, they must not be found out. He let out a silent breath and relaxed his shoulders, sending gratitude down the link to her.

Seira moved away from Frankenstein on swift feet. She wove through the people gathered around the betting table with grace, her head held high, every ounce of her emitting dignity and authority. Heads turned as she passed, eyes greedily taking in her beauty.

She was the first at the table and without hesitation, she took one of the pens and wrote down her bet.

“Number three will survive.” popped up on one of the screens, listing all the bets and their odds. Scattered snorts and impressed mumblings. A heavyset man at Frankenstein’s side chortled.

“Do you think she chose him for his looks?” he said to his companion before they both laughed derisively.

After Seira broke the ice, more bets started coming in. Most seemed to bet that Suyi would die. Frankenstein’s eyes narrowed. He had no doubt that M-21 would keep her alive, so with a small smirk he makes his own bet.

“Im Suyi will survive.”

Among all the bets, Frankenstein’s would yield the most in return if it came out a winner. He wasn’t blind to the looks his bet gave him, but he paid them no heed. As if he would ever care what these people thought of him.

Together with Seira, Frankenstein sat down at a table about three quarters back on the left side of the room. They could see all the screens well from here.

“Brave betting, _especially_ for first-timers. I’m impressed,” a brown haired woman with a deep blue dress, almost covered in golden jewellry, said as she sat down at their table. So they noticed new faces, interesting. Perhaps the group was smaller than they first believed.

Frankenstein let a smirk grow on his lips. Betting on M-21 was in no way a brave bet and for that reason, betting on Suyi would be a safe as well. Not that this woman would know that.

“Why play if you’re not going to take any risks?” Frankenstein shot back.

The woman laughed. Something about the sound felt… off. The laugh wasn’t explicitly fake, but there was something about it.

“I like the way you think.” She smirked in return. 

“It seems their strategy of bringing in a celebrity was a success. So many of our regulars have gathered, _and_ we’ve gotten more people.” Her gaze swept over the room before they settled on Frankenstein again. “I suppose many would like to see a pretty woman suffer.” Her laugh this time was like the crunching of crushed glass.

Before Frankenstein and Seira could reply, the man at the front spoke up again.

“Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for making your bets. The time has come for what you’ve all been waiting for. Let the game begin!”

Cheering broke out among the tables as the screens that had previously been dark flickered to life to finally show what looked like streams from video cameras.

Nine boat cabins with the people from the profiles, eight of them stirring. Frankenstein furrowed his brow—M-21 wasn’t waking up like the others.

~ ~ ~

When Suyi regained consciousness, it was to see a room she didn’t recognise; she was lying on an uncomfortable mattress in an old looking bunk bed.

She scrambled to her feet to look around. It seemed to be the sleeping quarters of a boat, but… How did she get here and _why_ was she here? It didn’t take her long to locate the door. There was a crude 1 drawn with red paint on it. Ignoring that, she grabbed the handle to open it, but it wouldn’t budge.

“Nnnngggh!” She pulled with all her strength, but nothing. It wouldn’t move a single centimeter. She felt a trickle of sweat at the back of her neck as she struggled.

There was an odd looking card reader with a lever by the side of the door. She pulled the lever, but all she received was an angry sounding beep and the display read “ERROR”.

Her eyes caught the flash of something red on her wrist. It looked like a digital watch, but the only thing showing on the display was a glowing blue one. (1). She pulled at it, trying to get it off but just like the door, it wouldn’t budge.

She turned back to the door and started banging on it.

“Let me out! _Let me out!_ ” Her screams seemed to echo in the room and she quickly realised that there was no point to keep going. If they’d kidnapped her, there was no way they would just let her out because she told them to.

She looked around the room wildly. There had to be a way out. Her eyes caught on a blue briefcase on the bottom bunk of the second bunk bed. She rushed over to it and tried to open it. Locked. Of course. She ground her teeth together in frustration. There had to be _some_ way to open it.

~ ~ ~

It was terrible to see Suyi scream and bang on the door, but neither Frankenstein nor Seira so much as blinked. Keeping a straight face was of utmost importance.

Their lives might not be in danger, dealing with non-enhanced humans as they were, but if they wanted to implement their plan without their abilities being discovered and without the “game participants”’s lives being in more danger than they already were, they would have to appear like your average human.

“Oh my, number three hasn’t woken up yet. At this rate he might not survive the first room.” The woman’s voice had a cruel sort of humour in it and she was smirking at Seira. Seira raised an eyebrow.

“How so?” she asked, meeting the woman’s gaze unflinchingly. The woman laughed.

“Oh, you’ll see soon enough. I’d hate to ruin the surprise for you.” She turned her attention back to the screens. Frankenstein frowned.

“Why is he the only one who hasn’t woken up? Has the game been rigged?” Frankenstein kept his eyes on the woman, to see her reaction. The slight stiffening of her posture was so minute most would have missed it entirely.

“Oh no, but they could have overdosed him on the sedative.” She giggled as if that was the funniest little joke she’d heard all day. “It’s happened before, unfortunately. One time a participant had an allergic reaction to it, so it could be something like that too. We’ll just have to see… Oh look! He’s starting to stir now!” The excitement in her voice was obviously fake. Frankenstein would not be the least surprised if she _wanted_ for as many of the participants to die as possible.

The noise level in the room suddenly rose. Six, seven, two and nine had gotten out of their rooms, heading into the hallway that connected all the rooms.

‘ _Believe in him. He will make it._ ’ Seira’s voice was calm in his head, though mind-to-mind she couldn’t hide her worry.

‘ _He will._ ’ Frankenstein thought back at her and they turned back to the screens.

~ ~ ~

There was static in his head, the world was muffled. The telltale feeling of being drugged out of his mind pervaded every cell of M-21’s body. He struggled to get his bearings, to cast off the drugs when suddenly there was a harsh shaking and he was in freefall for a short moment before his body connected to the floor and his head slammed against it. 

He groaned and rolled over to his stomach, trying to make the world stop spinning. His head pounded and he just barely kept from throwing up.

The sound of cracking glass was muted, but before he could wonder where it came from, something shattered and then there was a rush of water. It spilled across the floor and he got it in his mouth—tasting like salt and dirt—before he managed to lever himself off the floor.

The room span, but he still located the door quickly and threw himself at it. The water level was rising and he needed to get out of the room. _Now_.

The handle wouldn’t move. If he used his strength, he could probably rip the door clean off, unless… the whole thing seemed like some kind of Union experiment. They would have reinforced the walls and doors against enhanced humans. Besides, if it _wasn’t_ the Union, he shouldn’t let whoever set it in motion know of his enhanced abilities at all.

He backed away from the door, stumbling slightly from the still rather severe case of vertigo that afflicted him. There was a crudely painted 3 on the door and a card reader with a lever beside it. The card reader had a glowing red lamp on it. Locked.

The water licked at his ankles and he spun around, cataloguing his surroundings. There’s a blue briefcase on the bed, with both a code and key lock. As it was most likely locked, he let it be for the time being.

Close to the broken window—from which the water was gushing—was a sink with a framed picture on it. Above it was a mirror with something written on it.

** ◆△ ▽▲ **

Below the symbols there was an arrow, going from the left to the right, changing from red to blue. M-21’s narrowed. Considering the blue suitcase, this note was probably related. He turned his attention to the picture; it was of a ship. Completely useless as such, but perhaps the back of the picture…

He grabbed the photo frame and smashed it against the sink, easily breaking the glass. He pulled the photo out and turned it around. Just as he’d suspected!

1-■ 2-□ 3-▲ 4-△ 5-▼

6-▽ 7-◆ 8-◇ 9-○ 0-●

Of course, a code. Most likely the combination for the briefcase… but if there were red and blue numbers… Of course, there had to be another briefcase.

The water was lapping at his knees, he had no time to lose. Turning around, he moved to a closet and threw it open. As he’d deduced, a red briefcase lay inside. Which meant that he needed another note and two keys; he’d have to search the room quickly.

There was an old stove with a kettle on it. It was an odd addition to the room, so M-21 moved over and looked into the kettle. Inside lay a small blue key. Perfect.

He grabbed the key and continued his search, moving through the room, throwing the pillows and blankets off the beds until finally, he found another note beneath one of the pillows.

●□ ◇▼

He threw a quick glance at the code solutions in his head. ◆△◇▼ meant 7485 for the red briefcase and ●□▽▲ meant 0263 for the blue. If he could only find the red key, he might have found his way out of the flooding room.

There was a something covered by a sheet nearby the door—removing the cover revealed a red key taped to a mirror. He grabbed it, spun around—the sudden movement almost causing him to fall over, the vertigo still so strong—and staggered back to the blue suitcase on the bed.

He entered the code and turned the key. It opened with a small click. Inside were a file with papers and a few numbered key-cards.

He took the items and moved onto the red suitcase. Inside the red one there were only more key cards. He moved back to the door and glanced at the key cards. They were numbered with 1, 3, 5, 6, 7 and 9. Grabbing the 3 card to match the number on the door he drew it through the scanner and pulled the lever, all he got was an angry beep and “ERROR” flashing on the screen.

He tried all the cards, but none of them worked. The water was at his waist now; he was running out of time. Cursing softly he opened the file to see if perhaps it held any information. He scanned the information about “digital roots” and nodded to himself; he would need to add cards that made a digital root of three then.

He made some quick calculations in his head before he drew the 1, 5 and 6 cards through the reader. 1+5+6=12=1+2=3. The digital root three. He pulled the lever and the card reader beeped, the little lamp turned green and M-21 heard the door unlock.

He dropped the file and put his hand on the door handle. That’s when he noticed the thick watch-like object on his wrist. There was no clock face, instead there was only a glowing blue 3 on the display.

He gritted his teeth, he’d been numbered once more. 

He shook his throbbing head gently to clear his thoughts before he opened the door. 

~ ~ ~

Frankenstein mentally let out a sigh of relief when M-21 finally got the door open—the same emotion echoing from Seira’s mind—and moved away from the flooding room.

It had been awful to see him move around so obviously affected by whatever drug they’d used on him. The more he’d moved, the more he seemed to recover. They must have overdosed him something extreme for him with his advanced healing to be so affected.

He could feel anger emanating from Seira through their mental link, but her face betrayed nothing.

The woman by their table seemed quite disappointed that M-21 had made it out. “It seems your bet doesn’t end here after all. He thinks well under pressure,” she’d said when M-21 got the door open and then turned her attention back to the screens.

Frankenstein let his gaze sweep across the room. It was still far too early for either him or Seira to slip away. He turned back to the screens.

~ ~ ~

The vertigo was slowly going away as M-21 ran down the hallway, looking for a way out. At the end of the hallway he finally saw it: a small staircase leading to a door that was slightly open!

Moving through the doorway he nearly fell over when he stepped out through the door. He’d reached a large lavish room that was essentially an enormous staircase. Golden chandeliers, red carpets… It was very different from the bare metallic surroundings he’d just left.

He kept moving up the staircase. He heard raised voices from further away—they sounded frightened—and decided to move towards them. He finally found a group of people arguing in a large room. M-21 quickly looked at two large doors with the number 4 and 5 painted crudely on them in red paint, just like the door in the room he’d only just left, before he turned his attention back to the group.

One of the people caught his eye and his mouth went dry.

“Ahjussi!”

Suyi recognised him immediately and uncharacteristically threw herself in his arms. He held her gently and ground his teeth together. She was a _child_. How _dared_ whoever set this in motion bring a child into this!

The rest of the group was watching them and he could see glints of red around their wrists. They were most likely as much a prisoner here as he and Suyi were.

What was going on here?

**Author's Note:**

> This whole 999 fusion has been plotted together with [darkicedragon](http://darkicedragon.tumblr.com) over at tumblr. They've also written a version of the intro to this plot because if two writers plotting together for long enough they miiight just end up with itching writing fingers.


End file.
